204 replies to this topic

[Beezer34]

Didn't they average over 17,000 in 1998? Which is close to the Rock's capacity? In a more inaccessible arena that got worse over time? Still had to compete with others back then. With the right marketing and on-the-ice success like I mentioned, there's no reason why they couldn't average between 90-100% imo.

I never majored in socio-economics, but the financial structure of 1998 vs today, is 2 different worlds. I don't think people realize how a cardinal recession this historic, impacts sports. (or any disposable income type activities for that matter) People simply don't have the money to spend on a game.. food.. transportation.. parking.. etc. That's really all it boils down to.
I don't know if I'm just speaking for me, but the bottom line is.. if I had the money.. I would go more often.. simple as that.

The world of 1998 was also a world free of Stubhub, Craigslist, e-bay, and other such user-friendly ticket scalper agencies. Although these organizations offer easy/fast/cheap services to the working class man, they're inadvertently crippling the revenue from the gate. My friend's a sales rep for the Islanders. He makes season ticket calls routinely, and what he says always resonates with me; "When someone says 'I can get tickets for $6'.. how do I compete with that?" This puts a stranglehold on many franchises, and creates a disadvantage with some of the smaller market teams.

How many teams are mismanaged? Quite a bit. How many have owners that really don't care? Quite a bit.

I think contraction should absolutely be taken into consideration. When you're talking about hockey in the United States (in any financial era, not just the recession) 30 teams, is just too damn many. For the past 20 years, the NHL got too big for their britches.. and has grossly spread themselves too thin. You look at places like Columbus, Nashville, Phoenix, Carolina, Atlanta, etc.. should we ever have gone there in the first place? There were 21 teams in the NHL in 1991!! How did all of this happen??

I also feel the NHL season faces the same problem the NBA's does, in terms of length. 82 games is too many. June should be a month for BBQ's, the boardwalk, and baseball.. not hoisting Lord Stanley. When you have that many games throughout the year, your going to have instances of lack of interest from the casual fan.
Is the casual fan really going to go to a Tuesday night Devils game against Edmonton? I think if you had a 65 game season, with more divisional games and less filler, the league's overall average on attendance would improve.

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EDIT: I don't think the Devils are moving though. For any owner to get them out of their 30 year lease with the Newark Housing Authority (especially with no Nets in 2 years) would be a trick even Houdini would marvel over. To have a new arena.. empty? The city of Newark just wouldn't allow it.

Edited by Beezer34, 04 November 2011 - 11:17 PM.

[Jerrydevil]

I guess we'll find out if lenders will even allow Vanderbeek to restructure his debt. He might not be able to do that.

There's a lot we don't know. But the bankruptcy news isn't much of a surprise, considering that Chambers paid to get out. That was a serious red flag. I read the way you spun that a few posts back, and it seems like pure fantasy to me. We'll see.

[Colin226]

Colin,

Your perspective is just off. We had the Debtwire report that the Devils had a big payment and we know that they didn't pay. Multi-billionaires don't get to be billionaires by selling things for negative money. I fear the worst about Vanderbeek, but we'll see how this goes. Please stop using PR quotes from the paper and look at how people are acting.

OK so looking at actions.. again explain why Jeff CHOSE to take on an extra 47% of the debt for the team? Why would he do that if he couldn't handle it?

[NJDevs4978]

And people said the Post was stirring up **** with Sutter leaving when nobody else had that but they were right with that one too. Just because they have an agenda, doesn't mean they're inventing a story.

The best indication would be player contracts, yet we continue to spend on players like any other stable team..

What were they really going to be able to do to reduce the payroll in the offseason other than the buyouts of White/Rolston/Hunter and letting Greene go, which would have been another $2 milion in savings (a drop in the bucket compared to the supposed multi-million debt)? They weren't trading Zach, if they had traded Zach in the offseason for futures they could have kissed a majority of those 1900 new STH's goodbye and a bunch more wouldn't have renewed, they would have lost whatever money they saved on Zach this year in ticket sales.

It's just like when people said the Mets had a $150 million payroll, how can they be in trouble? The payroll was already on the books and there was no way of getting rid of the bad contracts. We'll find out just how stable the Devils are this offseason if Parise walks and the payroll drops to $40-45 million once our one-year contracts expire.

There's a lot we don't know. But the bankruptcy news isn't much of a surprise, considering that Chambers paid to get out. That was a serious red flag. I read the way you spun that a few posts back, and it seems like pure fantasy to me. We'll see.

Considering the bad blood when the sale was first announced, about how PuckHoldings had 'a different vision' for the franchise and how the Chambers group tried to trigger the sale of the whole team, I'm not buying the Chambers as a good guy fantasy either.

Edited by NJDevs4978, 04 November 2011 - 11:29 PM.

[Colin226]

And people said the Post was stirring up **** with Sutter leaving when nobody else had that but they were right with that one too. Just because they have an agenda, doesn't mean they're inventing a story.



What were they really going to be able to do to reduce the payroll in the offseason other than the buyouts of White/Rolston/Hunter and letting Greene go, which would have been $2 milion in savings? They weren't trading Zach, if they had traded Zach in the offseason for futures they could have kissed a majority of those 1900 new STH's goodbye and a bumch more wouldn't have renewed, they would have lost whatever money they saved on Zach this year in ticket sales.

It's just like when people said the Mets had a $150 million payroll, how can they be in trouble? The payroll was already on the books and there was no way of getting rid of the bad contracts. We'll find out just how stable the Devils are this offseason if Parise walks and the payroll drops to $40-45 million once our one-year contracts expire.

PLEASE!! First off, those STH were locked into contracts so they wouldn't have been able to do anything buy pay off their obligations.. Second, if Lou wanted to clear cap space at any price to help management it would have been easy.. Zach?! Come on, that would have been the easiest guy to trade.. Aside from players, there are so many expenses the team has to pay that we never even know about.. Did you know that the team is saving over $10k a month since they moved out of the old meadowlands warehouse this summer? Nope, but let's continue to speculate on team expenses when fans know 10% of what the team spends, not counting players...

[Colin226]

Considering the bad blood when the sale was first announced, about how PuckHoldings had 'a different vision' for the franchise and how the Chambers group tried to trigger the sale of the whole team, I'm not buying the Chambers as a good guy fantasy either.

Duh.. The team is worth more if you get a majority ownership.. The MEts botched partial minority ownership proved that.. Chamber's 47% matched Jeff's so any buyer would not only have to buy their portion of the team, be on the hook in the future for the debt, and not even have a majority say in the team.. You try selling anything under those conditions and let me know how it goes

Edited by Colin226, 04 November 2011 - 11:33 PM.

[NJDevs4978]

PLEASE!! First off, those STH were locked into contracts so they wouldn't have been able to do anything buy pay off their obligations.. Second, if Lou wanted to clear cap space at any price to help management it would have been easy.. Zach?! Come on, that would have been the easiest guy to trade.. Aside from players, there are so many expenses the team has to pay that we never even know about.. Did you know that the team is saving over $10k a month since they moved out of the old meadowlands warehouse this summer? Nope, but let's continue to speculate on team expenses when fans know 10% of what the team spends, not counting players...

So saving $120,000 a year on a warehouse is a big deal compared to the supposed level of debt?

I meant the people who became STH's over the summer probably wouldn't have done so if Lou had decided to trade Zach at the draft (when most big offseason deals happen). Not to mention gameday sales would be that much more in the toilet with the Devils all but guaranteed to be a non-playoff team.

Edited by NJDevs4978, 04 November 2011 - 11:38 PM.

[SMantzas]

I'm not gonna pretend to know the details of this crap, but what are the chances this team suddenly moves....a la Atlanta. If the Devils have to give up the Pru Center as collateral, who is gonna stop a new owner from moving to Canada?

[Colin226]

So saving $120,000 a year on a warehouse is a big deal compared to the supposed level of debt?

I meant the people who became STH's over the summer probably wouldn't have done so if Lou had decided to trade Zach at the draft (when most big offseason deals happen). Not to mention gameday sales would be that much more in the toilet with the Devils all but guaranteed to be a non-playoff team.

$120k compared to the $120 million Chamber and JVB would individually owe in the next 3 years... Do the math, we're talking 120k versus 240 million dollars.. Ticket sales? Again, how much do we make in extra ticket sales from having Zach Parise versus the 240 million in debt?

[NJDevs4978]

I'm not gonna pretend to know the details of this crap, but what are the chances this team suddenly moves....a la Atlanta. If the Devils have to give up the Pru Center as collateral, who is gonna stop a new owner from moving to Canada?

If someone was even able to get the Devils out of a twenty or so-year lease with the Prudential Center (which would be a mess of red tape in itself), why would anyone take a dump on being able to play in a brand new arena and getting a windfall from the lucrative MSG TV deal? The NHL would have something to say about that too, god knows they jumped through hoops to keep Balisle out.

[Jerrydevil]

Is it possible that Vanderbeek loves owning the Devils so much that he would do something unwise in a desperate move to hold on?

[Colin226]

I'm not gonna pretend to know the details of this crap, but what are the chances this team suddenly moves....a la Atlanta. If the Devils have to give up the Pru Center as collateral, who is gonna stop a new owner from moving to Canada?

Phoenix, as well as several other teams, are in far deeper dookie than the Devils.. Even the people worried about this could probably agree that the Devils have no chance of suddenly moving

[Colin226]

Is it possible that Vanderbeek loves owning the Devils so much that he would do something unwise in a desperate move to hold on?

Would Jeff allow his life fortune to go to sh*t over a team he loves? No.. He's not risking his life's savings and work for this team.. So obviously he wouldn't take on double the debt unless he had a plan.. You don't get as filthy rich as he did through being a stupid businessman

[NJDevs4978]

Would Jeff allow his life fortune to go to sh*t over a team he loves? No.. He's not risking his life's savings and work for this team.. So obviously he wouldn't take on double the debt unless he had a plan.. You don't get as filthy rich as he did through being a stupid businessman

He might have a plan but the current financial landscape is littered with guys who thought they had it all figured out, or kept borrowing and re-financing until it blew up in their face, including VBK's own Lehman Brothers. He wouldn't be the first or last businessman to do something incredibly stupid out of ego.

[Colin226]

He might have a plan but the current financial landscape is littered with guys who thought they had it all figured out, or kept borrowing and re-financing until it blew up in their face, including VBK's own Lehman Brothers. He wouldn't be the first or last businessman to do something incredibly stupid out of ego.

The financial landscape is full of people who had ideas before the economical crash.. Even so, Jeff knows how much he's worth and still willingly took on double the debt.. He could have told Chambers to keep shopping for a buyer, but he took the offer to take on double the debt for Chambers lowering the debt by $25 million.. I have yet to hear one person logically explain why Jeff has done this if he can't handle it

Edited by Colin226, 04 November 2011 - 11:57 PM.

[Triumph]

The financial landscape is full of people who had ideas before the economical crash.. Even so, Jeff knows how much he's worth and still willingly took on double the debt.. He could have told Chambers to keep shopping for a buyer, but he took the offer to take on double the debt for Chambers lowering the debt by $25 million.. I have yet to hear one person logically explain why Jeff has done this if he can't handle it

I have yet to hear a reason why he signed a guy to an $100 million dollar contract (over 15 years but still it's a huge financial commitment) and missed a $90 million dollar loan payment a year later. I've yet to hear why Lehman Brothers failed.

[Colin226]

I have yet to hear a reason why he signed a guy to an $100 million dollar contract (over 15 years but still it's a huge financial commitment) and missed a $90 million dollar loan payment a year later. I've yet to hear why Lehman Brothers failed.

The ownership group at the time (this included Chambers) "missed" the payment.. Why did they miss? Because Chambers was trying to sell his shares.. Of course Chambers wasn't going to pay millions towards the debt if he could sell to someone else who would.. That ended up not happening, so he paid $25 million towards the debt in order to not have to pay $120+ million in the next 3 years.. Would you do that? You'd be an idiot not to if that was your only option to get out of the debt..

But good point, why was Jeff pushing for the Kovy deal if he couldn't pay for it? Again, why would someone take on a huge financial commitment (just like he chose to take on Chambers' $120+ million in debt) if he couldn't afford it? That kind of obligation doesn't help you if you're looking to sell the team, so that helps my point..

Why did Lehman fail? I don't care, but Jeff had the forseight to get out before it did which just adds to his credability as a good businessman.. So, again, why would he willingly take on Chambers' $120+ million debt obligation (adding to his own $120+ million obligation, so that $240+ million) if he didn't have a plan to handle it?

[Jerrydevil]

With all of this financial mess, I would think that this year will be the last one for Lamoriello.

[RowdyFan42]

With all of this financial mess, I would think that this year will be the last one for Lamoriello.

It might be his last year regardless of the financial situation.

[2L3MI3UX2]

Anyone else wish they should have build the arena in Hoboken.  The town is filled with people people 18-35 years old with decent jobs who would be steps away from the arena, and the PATH and NJTransit rail (light and regular) have hubs there...  Driving would have been tougher than Newark, but the town is great and would have been so much cooler to go out before an after games in that town.